The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1887-03-05

. ''S''' "S'''lN'l, VI ilblllOl Will MI
lowed the harshness of that new and
raw life Of the prairies. He never asked
Tor help, but was always ready to give
It, He received everybody's conf
dence, and rarely gave his own in re-
turn. He took no mean advantages in
court or in conversation, and, satisfied
with the respect and kindlin,ss which
he everywhere met, he sought no quar-
rels and never had to decline them.
He did not accumulate wealth as
Judge Davis said, che seemed never to
care for it." He had good income
from his profession, though the fees he
received would bring a smile to the
well paid lips of the great attorneys of
to-day. The largest fee he ever got
was one of five thousand dollars from
the Illinois Central Railway, and he
had to bring suit to compel them to
pay it. He spent what he received in
the education of his children, in the
care of his family, and in a plain and
generous way Of living.
LINcOLN's FORTUNATE ESCAPE.
The authors of The Century Life of
Lincoln thus refer to Lincoln's escape
from becoming a resident office holder
under the Washington Government,
after his Congressional term had ex
pred 1T was IN this way that Abra
ham Lincoln met and escaped one OF
the greatest dangers of his life. In after
years he recognized the error he had
committed. and congratulated himself
upon the happy dehveranCe he had OBJ
tanned through no merit of his own.
The loss OF at least four years of the
active pursuit of his profession would
have been rreparable, leaving out of
view the strong probability that the sin
gular charm OF Washington life to men
who have d passion for politics might
have kept him there forever. 1t has
been SAID that a residence in Washing
ton leaves no man precisely as it found
him. This is an axiom that may be
applied to most cities in certain sense,
but Ii Is true in a peculiar degree of
our capital. TO the men who come
there from small rural communities in
the South and West, the hustle and
stir, the intellectual movement, such as
it is, the ordinary subject of conversa-
ton, of SUCH vastly Crater Importance
than anything they have previously
known, the daily and hourly combats
on the floor of both houses, the in
trigue and the struggle of office hunt
ing, which interest vast numbers be-
sides the office seekers, the superior
plqHanCy and interest of the scandal
which is talked at Congress boarding
house over that which seasons the dull
days at village tavern,-all this gives
d SAVIOR to Washington, the memory of
which doubles the tedium of the Sc
guestered vale to which the beaten
legislator returns when his Orief hour
OF glory is over. Il is this which brings
to the State Department, after every
general election, that crowd of spec
tiers, with their bales of recommends
tons from plying colleagues who have
been reelected, whose diminishing
prayers run down the whole gamut of
supphcaton from St. James to St. Paul
of l.oando, and of whom at the last it
must be said, as Mr.. Evarts once said
after an unusually heavy day, "Many
called, bu, few chosen OF those
who do not achieve the ruillous success
of going abroad to consulates that will
not pay their board, or missions where
they only avoid daily shame by hiding
their perjury and their ignorance away
from observation, a great p~rtion yield
to their fate and join that fleet of
wrecks which floats forever on the pave
ment of Washington.
at is needless to say that Mr.. Lin
coin received no damage from his term
of service in Washington, but we know
of nothing which shows SO strongly the
perilouS fascination of the place as the
fact that man of his extraordinary
moral and mental qualities could ever
have thought for moment of accept
ing position SO insignificant and IN
CongruOus as that which he was more
than willing TO assume when he left
Congress. He would have filled the
place with honor and with Credit-but
at monStrouS expense. We do not
SO much refer to his exceptional ca
reer and his great figure in history J;
these momentous contingencies could
not have suggested themselves to him.
But the place he was reasonably sure
of filling in the battle of life should
have made subordinate office in
Washington thing out of the ques-
ton. He was already lawyer of skill
and reputation an orator upon whom
his party relied to speak for them to
the people. IN innate love OF com
bat was IN his heart he loved discus
sion like a medieval schoolman. The
air was already tremulouS with faint
bugle-noteS that heralded a conflict of
giants on a field of moral significance
to which he was fully alive and awake
where he was certain to lead at least
his hundreds and his thousands. Yet
if Justin Bltteriirlt had not been
more supple, more adroit, and less
ScrnpuIOus sutton tor office than him
self, Abraham Lincoln would have sat
for four inestimable years at bureau
desk in the Interior department, and
when the hour of action sounded in